


Horror

by muirgen_lys



Series: Anchors [1]
Category: Dragon Age II
Genre: Complicated Relationships, Gen, Mild Hurt/Comfort, Panic Attacks
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-01-27
Updated: 2015-01-27
Packaged: 2018-03-09 07:05:20
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,401
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3240737
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/muirgen_lys/pseuds/muirgen_lys
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Fenris has a panic attack after getting hit with a spell during a minor skirmish with slavers. Anders recognises it and talks him through it.<br/></p>
            </blockquote>





	Horror

**Author's Note:**

> from this lovely kmeme prompt: http://dragonage-kink.livejournal.com/11381.html?thread=49061237#t49061237

There's a rhythm to battle. He falls into it easily, naturally, after so long, finding the nearest attackers and ripping into them, seeing them fall one by one in front of him. The lyrium hums sickeningly through his skin, touching his targets with a faint, blue-white glow, but it doesn't hurt, exactly, and he ignores it. 

The slavers have a mage with them. Hawke has been handling it, wearing him down, but Hawke is surrounded now, distracted trying to hold off four others, and the mage slips away. Fenris charges after him, and Isabela appears beside him, flickering like a shadow, and he feels, rather than seeing, the ice flicker up behind him, entrapping the enemies he'd abandoned there.

The mage is already casting when they reach him, and the spell washes through Fenris like a thunderbolt, buzzing harshly in his markings. 

Then the visions start. 

Part of him knows it's nothing - a phantasm dragged out of his memories by vile magic. But it _feels_ real, and he stumbles, fighting to throw off the image.

_Come here pet...come to master..._

He shakes himself, squeezing his eyes shut. It doesn't help.

_Kill them. Kill them all._

Somewhere in the recesses of his mind, his eyes are still working. He can see the slavers, stumbling away from Hawke, the blasted abomination throwing fire. But he can't make his eyes focus, can't make his body move.

_When I find you, Fenris, and you know I will find you..._

Terror rises in his mind, setting his heart pounding, and he tries desperately to force it quiet, not sure whether he's doing it for his own sake, or out of fear that Danarius will hear the noise and come after him.

It's not so long, only a few seconds all told...but by the time he recovers his balance he's pale, and shaking, and Hawke and Anders have mostly cleared the field. Isabela is tense, her mouth set in a thin line, but she moves with deadly speed, and Fenris follows, heavy sword moving like lightning.

By the time the mage goes down, he's exhausted. That much is normal. He doesn't usually notice in the heat of the fight, but battle is hard on the body, pushing it to its limits.

It takes a few minutes for him to realise that he isn't recovering. Catching his breath is getting harder, not easier, and his limbs feel weighted with lead. He waves for Hawke to stop, but the human doesn't see, and Fenris is slowing, leaning his hands on his knees, trying to breathe, then swallowing hard as his stomach twists. He can't shake the feeling of a collar around his neck, bindings across his chest, suffocating him, and he drops to his knees, gasping. His hands are going numb, and he can't...he can't breathe. He can't breathe. He can't...

*

“Where did he...?” Hawke spins looking for the elf.

“Must have fallen behind,” says Isabela. “I didn't see.”

Hawke turns back, frowning. 

The frown turns to genuine worry as he sees the elf collapsed on the beach, curled over his knees, gasping. He swears, and charges towards the elf, Anders and Isabela following on his heels. He drops to his knees beside his friend, looking for injuries.

“Hawke.” Anders puts a hand on the warrior's shoulder, but the man shrugs it off. “Hawke!”

“What?”

“Back off,” he says. “You're crowding him.”

“What's wrong with him?”

“Nothing permanent,” the mage replies, and the look in his eyes shuts down Hawke's angry response. “Go up the path a ways,” he said, “we'll be along in a minute.”

*

“Fenris.”

The sound echoes oddly. He sucks air, hands scrabbling at the sand. 

“Fenris, listen to me. I know it feels like you're dying right now, but I promise you're not.”

The way his chest feels right now, that promise is shaky comfort, but since it's all he has right now he'll take it. He latches onto the words like a drowning man. He still feels like he's suffocating, but he's not dead. Maybe it will stay that way.

“I want you to try something,” the voice continues, calm and steady, everything he isn't, _can't be_ , right now. “I want you to try to breathe out for as long as you can, like you're rekindling a fire.” It takes him a moment to sort through the words, and when he finally does, he shakes his head, a single jerky movement. But the voice continues undaunted. “You don't have to, but I'd like you to try if you can. One long breath.”

He tries, and some faint, distant part of him is surprised that his body cooperates. When his lungs are finally empty, he feels a brief flash of terror that he's not going to be able to turn it off, that he's forgotten how to breath in again. But then he does, and the air steadies him, slowing his racing mind.

“It's alright,” the voice continues. “You're doing fine. It doesn't last as long as it feels like it does. In, in, and then out again, slow, as long as you can.”

He nods, and does. His vision, which had somehow narrowed down the the small patch of sand and scrub grass right in front of him, starts to open out, and he looks up to see the mage looking at him, a faint expression of concern on his features.

“Good,” says Anders. “You're going to be alright. It looks like it's getting better. No rush though,” he adds. “Take all the time you want.”

His breathing is still shaky, but he's starting to be able to feel his hands again, the sand rough under his fingers. He's shaking, long wracking shudders that tear through him like a shock of lightening. 

“You're okay,” the mage says hesitantly. “Keep breathing.”

He nods, and breathes, too shaken to care that he's taking orders from a mage. Eventually the tightness in his chest and throat eases, and his arms feel half normal again. He gets unsteadily to his feet, feeling as if he'd been run over by an ogre.

“What happened?” he asks hoarsely.

The mage steps back, seeming less certain now that the emergency is over. “Karl called them panic attacks,” he says. “It's like being afraid but...more so. As if the fear takes over, and your body doesn't know how to break out of it.”

He shakes his head, trying to clear it. “I felt like I was choking.”

Another nod. “I used to say it felt like a Templar was kneeling on my chest.”

That was an apt enough description, if not the image he would have chosen. It was – wait. “You?” he demands.

Anders takes a few steps away, looking out over the landscape. “They started after my next-to-last escape,” he says. “Templars, it turns out, don't appreciate being made to look foolish.” He looks down, fidgetting. “When they finally let me out, I was as jittery as a mouse. I kept thinking I would make a mistake, or catch the attention of the wrong templar, and they'd throw me back.”

“Couldn't you fix it with magic?”

The mage rolls his eyes. “You always say that word like it's a curse,” he comments. Then, shaking his head, “There's nothing to fix. The body is doing what it's supposed to do when you're threatened. But when the threat isn't real, or when doing something about it isn't an option...it can backfire on you.”

“I saw Danarius,” he says. “That _spell_...it was like he was here. I could hear his voice, commanding me to -” he breaks off.

“I hate that fucking spell.” Fenris twitches at the sudden venom in the mage's voice. “Every time I get hit with it...” The mage puffs out a breath, and shakes his head again. “Some things you don't want to remember,” he says. “Better to just fireball someone than to turn their own mind against them.” 

He looks over at Fenris, clinical now. “You're looking better,” he says. “Come on. Hawke and Isabela are just up the path.”

Hawke. Fasta vass, how is he supposed to explain this to him?

“You don't have to tell them,” Anders says, as if reading his thoughts. “There's no shame in it but...you don't owe anyone an explanation.”

He's not sure he believes that, but it's better than nothing. 

He sighs. “Let's just get moving.”


End file.
